World Vision is an international Christian relief, development and advocacy organisation working in almost 100 countries world-wide to create lasting change in the lives of children, families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice. The Architecture Practice Lead is responsible for leading, developing, and supporting architects across the practice, including Solution, Lead, and Enterprise Architects. This role focuses on building a cohesive, high-performing architecture practice with clear roles, expectations, and ways of working, rather than acting as the primary technical authority.
Key Responsibilities
Practice Leadership & Capability Development
- Lead, develop, and support architects across the practice (Solution, Lead, and Enterprise Architects).
- Build a cohesive, high-performing architecture practice with clear roles, expectations, and ways of working.
- Drive capability development, mentoring, and skills uplift aligned to organizational needs.
- Plan and manage architecture practice capacity to balance demand, priorities, and available resources across the portfolio.
- Foster a culture of professionalism, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
Operational Enablement of Architecture & Technical Debt
- Enable consistent identification, documentation, and visibility of architectural risks and technical debt.
- Support the Principal Architect in maintaining visibility of the technical debt baseline and agreed remediation actions.
- Embed architecture engagement into governance, service lifecycle, and planning processes.
- Coordinate inputs and follow-through across architects, delivery teams, and governance forums.
Integration, Governance & Reporting
- Integrate the architecture practice into portfolio, demand, and governance forums.
- Ensure architecture engagement is predictable, timely, and clearly understood across the organization.
- Enable effective use and adoption of architecture tools, repositories, and artefacts to support decision-making, governance, and practice maturity.
- Ensure architecture information remains accessible, accurate, and relevant for stakeholders and leadership.
- Provide visibility of architecture practice health, capacity, and effectiveness to senior stakeholders.
- Continuously refine architecture ways of working based on feedback and outcomes.
Professional Behaviors & Capabilities
- Enabling leadership: Focuses on enabling architects to perform at their best rather than acting as the primary technical authority.
- Clear and consistent communication: Transparent communication of expectations and priorities across diverse stakeholder groups.
- Coordination & integration: Reduces friction, duplication, and ambiguity across teams and functions.
- Respect for technical authority: Actively protects and reinforces the technical authority of senior architects.
- Professional integrity: Acts with fairness, transparency, and accountability in people and practice leadership.
Role Boundaries & Escalation
- This role does not act as the primary technical authority for architectural decisions.
- This role does not override architectural judgment made by senior architects.
- Technical arbitration, architectural trade-offs, and technical debt prioritization remain with the Principal Architect.
Knowledge, Skill and Experience
Required Education
- Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field.
Professional Experience
- Architectural practice & operating model knowledge: Strong understanding of enterprise architecture practices, roles, and engagement models across solution, domain, and enterprise levels. Experience embedding architecture into governance, portfolio management, and delivery lifecycles.
- Stakeholder leadership & communication: Strong experience engaging senior business and technology leaders on architecture outcomes, priorities, and performance. Ability to translate architectural work into clear business value, risks, and maturity progress for executives.
- People & practice leadership experience: Experience leading or enabling professional teams in a capability or practice model; experience coaching and developing senior technical professionals.
- Operational & governance experience: Experience coordinating work across multiple teams, initiatives, and governance forums; experience tracking practice performance and capacity.
How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should apply online via the World Vision recruitment portal at World Vision Kenya Career Portal.
